A Little Journey in the World | Page 3

rising towards a range of hills which showed purple and warm against the pale straw-color of the winter sunsets. The charm of the situation was that the house was one of many comfortable dwellings, each isolated, and yet near enough together to form a neighborhood; that is to say, a body of neighbors who respected each other's privacy, and yet flowed together, on occasion, without the least conventionality. And a real neighborhood, as our modern life is arranged, is becoming more and more rare.
I am not sure that the talkers in this conversation expressed their real, final sentiments, or that they should be held accountable for what they said. Nothing so surely kills the freedom of talk as to have some matter-of-fact person instantly bring you to book for some impulsive remark flashed out on the instant, instead of playing with it and tossing it about in a way that shall expose its absurdity or show its value. Freedom is lost with too much responsibility and seriousness, and the truth is more likely to be struck out in a lively play of assertion and retort than when all the words and sentiments are weighed. A person very likely cannot tell what he does think till his thoughts are exposed to the air, and it is the bright fallacies and impulsive, rash ventures in conversation that are often most fruitful to talker and listeners. The talk is always tame if no one dares anything. I have seen the most promising paradox come to grief by a simple "Do you think so?" Nobody, I sometimes think, should be held accountable for anything said in private conversation, the vivacity of which is in a tentative play about the subject. And this is a sufficient reason why one should repudiate any private conversation reported in the newspapers. It is bad enough to be held fast forever to what one writes and prints, but to shackle a man with all his flashing utterances, which may be put into his mouth by some imp in the air, is intolerable slavery. A man had better be silent if he can only say today what he will stand by tomorrow, or if he may not launch into the general talk the whim and fancy of the moment. Racy, entertaining talk is only exposed thought, and no one would hold a man responsible for the thronging thoughts that contradict and displace each other in his mind. Probably no one ever actually makes up his mind until he either acts or puts out his conclusion beyond his recall. Why should one be debarred the privilege of pitching his crude ideas into a conversation where they may have a chance of being precipitated?
I remember that Morgan said in this talk that there was too much diversity. "Almost every church has trouble with it--the different social conditions."
An Englishman who was present pricked-up his ears at this, as if he expected to obtain a note on the character of Dissenters. "I thought all the churches here were organized on social affinities?" he inquired.
"Oh, no; it is a good deal a matter of vicinage. When there is a real-estate extension, a necessary part of the plan is to build a church in the centre of it, in order to--"
"I declare, Page," said Mrs. Morgan, "you'll give Mr. Lyon a totally erroneous notion. Of course there must be a church convenient to the worshipers in every district."
"That is just what I was saying, my dear: As the settlement is not drawn together on religious grounds, but perhaps by purely worldly motives, the elements that meet in the church are apt to be socially incongruous, such as cannot always be fused even by a church-kitchen and a church-parlor."
"Then it isn't the peculiarity of the church that has attracted to it worshipers who would naturally come together, but the church is a neighborhood necessity?" still further inquired Mr. Lyon.
"All is," I ventured to put in, "that churches grow up like schoolhouses, where they are wanted."
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Morgan; "I'm talking about the kind of want that creates them. If it's the same that builds a music hall, or a gymnasium, or a railway waiting-room, I've nothing more to say."
"Is it your American idea, then, that a church ought to be formed only of people socially agreeable together?" asked the Englishman.
"I have no American idea. I am only commenting on facts; but one of them is that it is the most difficult thing in the world to reconcile religious association with the real or artificial claims of social life."
"I don't think you try much," said Mrs. Morgan, who carried along her traditional religious observance with grateful admiration of her husband.
Mr. Page Morgan had inherited money, and a certain advantageous position for observing life and criticising